Onze modellen
Thirty years of research. Four models that turn tension into traction.
The cornerstones of our approach are the models developed by Fons Trompenaars, Charles Hampden-Turner and Peter Woolliams — an intellectual property backed by more than thirty years of research, and used by leaders worldwide to make culture measurable, manageable, and deliverable.
One mindset. One process. Two models that make the work measurable.
The four models
A mindset, a process, and two ways to make culture measurable.
Our four models work together. Dilemma Thinking is the mindset that generates value from competing demands. The 4R Approach is the process that turns that mindset into integration. The 7 Dimensions of Culture and the 4 Corporate Cultures make the differences visible — so they can be reconciled rather than wished away.
- Dilemma Thinking. The mindset that generates value from competing demands. → Find out more
- The 4R Approach. The process to follow for long-term integration — Recognise, Respect, Reconcile, Realise. → Find out more
- 7 Dimensions of Culture. The key to understanding cultural differences. → Find out more
- The 4 Corporate Cultures. The deep dive into cultural archetypes that foster change. → Find out more
Dilemma denken
All people face the same dilemmas. Culture decides how we resolve them.
Dilemma Reconciliation is the methodology at the heart of everything we do. It is a switch of mindset — counter-intuitive for those trained on bipolar models — that combines opposites with AND rather than picking between them.
"The dilemma reconciliation is the methodology at the heart of everything we do. It implies a switch of mindset, that can seem a bit counter-intuitive for Western people, typically used to bipolar models."
— Dr. Fons Trompenaars
Our "best of both" approach combines opposites with AND. The benefits are practical: we surface the real performance blockers by asking the right questions, find more accurate problem definitions, and produce solutions that work across cultures rather than only in one.
Either-or is a choice. Both-and is a compromise. Through-through is a reconciliation.
7 Dimensies van Cultuur
Seven dimensions. One way to measure difference.
Developed in the 1980s by Fons Trompenaars and Charles Hampden-Turner and refined through decades of continuing research, the 7D model is one of the most widely cited frameworks for understanding cultural differences. The seven dimensions fall into three groups — each one a universal tension every organisation and every society resolves in its own way.
- Human relationships.
Tensions that arise from how we relate to other people — universalism and particularism, individualism and communitarianism, neutral and affective, specific and diffuse, achieved and ascribed status. - Time.
How organisations and societies handle the passage of time — sequential versus synchronic, and the relative weight of past, present and future. - Environment.
How people relate to the world around them — internal versus external control, and where agency is assumed to sit.
If you can't measure something, you can't manage it. The 7D makes culture measurable.
The 4 Corporate Cultures
Four archetypes. All four in your DNA.
Every organisation has a preferred way of operating, shaped by two orienting questions:
- Is the focus of what we do more on tasks or on people?
- Do we operate in a more egalitarian or hierarchical way?
The answers map to four ideal-type corporate cultures — the Family, the Eiffel Tower, the Guided Missile and the Incubator. Each is an archetype rather than a label: no organisation is 100% any one of them. The dominant type reveals how people think and learn, how they change, and how they motivate, reward and resolve conflict.
High performance does not live in any single archetype. It lives in organisations that carry all four in their DNA, reconciling the competing demands between them.
"Organisational culture is the end result of competing values fighting for preference."
— Fons Trompenaars
Benadering
The 4R process — from insight to integratie.
The 4R Approach is the process we follow to take dilemmas from recognition through to lasting integration. Four steps that move leadership teams beyond abstract culture conversations — to the tensions that matter, the reconciliations that resolve them, and the behaviours that make the strategy deliverable.
1 Recognise
Surface the dilemmas that matter.
Data-driven diagnostics make the current culture and desired direction visible and measurable. We map the tensions strategy creates, not the ones leadership assumes are there.
2 Respect
Map the logic of both sides.
Blended workshops surface why each side is partially right and partially incomplete. Teams see the strengths of the existing culture, and the pathologies that appear when a value is disconnected from its opposite.
3 Herstellen
Find higher-order solutions where each side strengthens the other.
Our Dilemma Reconciliation Process moves teams from either-or, and from both-and, to through-through — by asking how we can get more of value X through value Y, and more of Y through X.
4 Realise
Embed reconciliations in behaviours, structures and processes.
Without translation, values remain rhetorical. Our Values-to-Behaviour (V2B) process converts each reconciled value into a concise Charter of Behaviour — specific, observable, day-to-day. Structures and processes follow.
"While most organisations focus on recognising cultural differences only — the stereotypes — we help leaders take advantage of those differences."
— Fons Trompenaars
Laten we praten
Put the models to work on your dilemma.
Whether you are aligning culture to a new strategy, integrating after a merger, or turning values into daily behaviour — the models are the starting point. Let's talk about the tension deciding whether your strategy lives or dies.